Girl Meets Realization
by Karlita Sirbala
Summary: Hi everyone! So I got inspired to write this and I feel horrible that I haven't worked on my other fic but there just hasn't been a muse for it. Maybe I'm better at one shots for now. Hopefully though, I will finish that story eventually. I hope you enjoy this fic. I'm just Rilaya trash to be honest.


You think the universe has some twisted sense of humor for it to be doing this to you right now. You're sitting on a bench, your possible crush smack dab in the middle of you and your best friend. And you just found out from Farkle that said best friend still likes your maybe, sort of, crush. You look over and the first thing you see is Lucas, looking like he would rather be anywhere but here. But he's here and he looks torn, torn between the two of you. And your heart aches just slightly because you think that maybe he shouldn't be torn; maybe he should just want you so you could have a chance at some semblance of happiness. But then you look past him and you see her, your best friend, your Riley. And she looks beautiful; a portrait of sad beauty sitting right across from you and your fingers itch for a piece of paper and paints, just so you could capture the raw image that you see before your eyes. She looks beautiful, you think again. In the midst of all the confusion and pain she must be feeling, you can't help but be in awe of how she still composes herself, of how ethereal she looks. And that's when something shifts in your head and you cock your head to the side, your eyes widening a bit and your mouth opening just slightly. Something shifts and it makes you not be able to breathe; you feel suffocated and claustrophobic and you realize Lucas is way too close to you and Riley much too far away. So you decide to do what you do best; you decide to run. You stand swiftly to your feet, your hair bouncing in a panicked frenzy. Lucas and Riley stand up too; your sudden movement jolting them into action.

"Maya" Riley quietly says, her eyes so sad and worried that you have to look away because you know you'll drown in them if you look at her and the realization in your head shifts some more and you're doing all you can just to breathe normally.

"I can't be here right now" you say just as quietly, looking out over the rooftop, not being able to meet any of their gazes right now. You start to move away from them when you feel two separate hands holding on to your wrists.

"Maya, don't go. Don't run."

"Peaches, I'm so sorry. Don't leave me." And with that the air seemed to get a little bit thinner and you really, really feel like you'll black out sooner than later if you don't leave.

"I can't do what you both want from me right now. I'm sorry" you say as you wrench yourself away from both of them and you run, not sparing a glance back at the two forlorn stares that followed you until you were out of sight.

Three days. It's been three days of you being holed up in your room, ignoring every text, call, and tweet from your friends. You've basically shut yourself away from everyone in the real world. Your mom is worried and you feel bad but the turmoil inside of you is too much to let out, let alone to your mom. The only person who you could possibly think of turning to is the reason why you're having such a dilemma. So you've ignored everything and everyone and you've just been wallowing in your emotions and revelations. And you've painted. Oh yes, how you've painted. At first, it was just swirls of different colors, vibrant and brash against your canvas, hoping to convey what you were feeling inside. Then it turned to portraits. You made one of Lucas and you had to reach far into the recesses of your mind to remember one moment where you thought he looked like the prince Riley always made him out to be and how you thought you would eventually see him as. You stare at it and well…. it's okay. Not your best work but not your worst so it's okay. So you get another piece of canvas and you just let your hand do the thinking and after a while, you have another portrait. And it's of Riley. Riley, when she was sitting across from you, looking away into the universe, the weight of the whole world seemingly on her shoulders, all the while radiating tragic beauty. And then you get inspired. So you keep drawing and drawing until your fingers ache and there's pictures of Riley everywhere. You've drawn her before, that's nothing new, but nothing like this. Not with this intensity, this passion, this compulsion. And that's when the final shift occurs. You know what it means. So you lay down and you stare at your ceiling while looking back at flashbacks of Riley and Lucas and what exactly you thought you saw in Lucas. You come to the conclusion that what you saw in Lucas was Riley. He was the embodiment of Riley but in a guy's body. But then you think that's an injustice to Riley because you realize no one will be as perfect as her so you subconsciously latched on to the one person who was close enough. Everything slowly starts to sink in and your internal turmoil is still raging inside of you but a little bit more quietly now. Just then, you hear a tap on your window and you sit up, seeing Farkle outside, a sad smile gracing his lips. You sigh and then stand up, making your way over to your window before opening it so he could come in.

"Maya"

"Farkle"

"You haven't been answering any of my calls or texts."

"I haven't answered anyone's calls or texts."

"I know" he says softly and you wonder what he's been talking about to Zay, to Lucas, to….Riley.

"We're worried, Maya. You've shut us out for three days. You need to talk to us."

"I just needed a little space, Farkle. Don't you get that?"

"I do but we just got worried. There has been zero contact from you. Zero. I can understand if you can't talk to me or Zay and definitely not Lucas, but you haven't even tried talking to…." He trails off, seemingly hesitant to say her name, as if it might send me down some kind of spiral.

"You can say her name, you know. I'm not mad at her."

"You're not?"

"No, she's my best friend. I love her" and your heart feels a little lighter and a little heavier at the same time as you utter those three words. Farkle looks at you then, stares a little longer than necessary before shifting his eyes around your room, landing on the dozens of portraits of Riley thrown about. He walks over and picks one up, the one from New Years, and then he spots the only portrait you drew of Lucas. He holds them both, side by side as if he was doing a comparison and in your mind, you knew that he was. And you get anxious because you think he might have figured it out and he might go and tell Riley just like he told you and Lucas about Riley. And you get angry for one second because it wasn't his place to tell and you want to lash out but you just stand there and wait.

"She's beautiful" he says with a hint of a smile gracing his lips as he looks over Riley's picture. "He looks good too but I don't know, there's something missing, you know?" And boy, do you ever but you don't say a word. "Riley told me she was trying to do what she thought was right, what would make everyone happy. I told her you probably didn't know what you wanted, that you were probably confused about so many things, especially your feelings. So what she was doing probably wasn't the right thing. I think she's confused too. I think…. she probably doesn't know what she wants. She might have but I think things have changed. Really changed." He looks at you as he says this, his eyes trying to convey something that you're quite not grasping.

"You should talk to her; she's kind of losing it without you" he says seriously and your heart clenches at the millions of images of Riley that pass through your head because of his words, none of them happy.

"I'm scared" you suddenly say and you surprise yourself with what you just admitted to him. But he just walks over to you and pulls you into a hug.

"I know. But it's okay. I might not understand feelings and emotions all that well but I do understand you two. Trust me, it's not going to be that scary afterwards." You nod slowly and you decide to cling to Farkle a little longer, relishing in that rare show of affection that he's giving you and that you're allowing before going over to the Matthews to see the girl who you've finally realized you're in love with.

You don't knock on the front door; you felt it would have been too weird having to face the Matthews right now, especially since she knows Riley probably told them what happened. Besides, climbing up the fire escape to Riley's window has always been their thing, no matter what. So she gets to her window and lingers there, gazing at Riley as she sits on her bed, looking dejectedly at her phone. You wonder if she's waiting for your call, for anything from you that can tell her if you're okay and you hate yourself even more for making her feel this way. You tap on her window and she quickly looks up and you look at the bags under her eyes and the way her body moves as she takes in a shaky breath before running to let you inside. You slip in and you both stand there, looking at each other. You feel your fingers twitch and you're aching to touch her, to hold her, to comfort her. But you're kind of frozen in place and Riley just bites her lip, not knowing what to do.

"Honey" you shakily let out after what seems like a lifetime and that's all it takes; she rushes toward you and envelops you in a bone crushing hug that makes you feel all warm inside and that doesn't let you breathe but in a good way. And then you feel tears on your shirt and you feel her lips on your neck, whispering broken I'm sorrys and I missed you and please don't hate me. It takes all that you have within to not burst out crying yourself so you just slightly detach yourself from her before leading her to her bed and laying down. Riley follows suit and you're both on your sides, facing each other; Riley is still sobbing and it's ironic how you think she still shines like the sun even with all the sadness surrounding her. You wipe her tears with your fingers and you slightly caress her cheek, whispering words like I'm not mad at you, it's okay, we're okay, until her sobs slowly start to subside and her breathing returns to normal. She looks at you and you look back; her eyes puffy from the tears but still so beautiful. It's her voice that breaks the silence first.

"You're here" she says with such relief and disbelief that you melt a little more for her.

"I am"

"And you're not mad at me?

"I'm not."

"Why?"

"Because you're more important to me than any guy will ever be" and it's the truth. In more ways than one. And you decide you might as well just keep going and let it all out there because you're done with not going for what you want. Even if everything goes to shit, at least you know that you tried.

"You know" you say quietly, your eyes cast downward, looking at the small space between your body and Riley's, wanting to reach out to interlace your fingers with hers so you could feel a little more courageous. Riley must sense this because she reaches out and grabs your hand, giving it a gentle squeeze that was meant to encourage you to keep going. "You know, you always seemed to see Lucas as a prince. Like he was your knight in shining armor, your cowboy meant to whisk you away. It's like he was bathed in gold and all you could see was the beauty of his shining light. And I didn't understand what you saw in him until I thought I did. I thought…. I thought I was finally seeing what you saw." At this, Riley's hold on your hand slackens just a bit and you don't understand why but you can't have her let go so you hold on tighter before you lose your courage. "But the thing is, I was trying to make myself fall for him; I was trying to make myself see him the way you saw him because he reminded me so much of you. Not everything but enough for me to play into the illusion. That night on your roof though? That's when everything changed. Because that night, he wasn't illuminated in gold; you were. Even in the darkness, you're always glowing to me. You always have been and it took that night for everything to start making sense. You're my princess Riley; my princess that I didn't even know I was looking for." A moment passes, then two, and now you're starting to hyperventilate because Riley hasn't said a word and you know you decided to do this but the thought that Riley might leave you because of this doesn't hit you until silence is the only thing filling the room. Your hand starts to sweat and you want to pull away and you subconsciously do just that but Riley holds your hand in a vice grip which shocks you enough to look up. And what you see surprises you beyond belief; Riley is smiling. She's smiling that megawatt smile of hers that appears when she's extremely happy about something and you don't understand what's going.

"Peaches….these past three days without you have been hell" you're a little shocked that Riley said a "bad" word but you say nothing so she can continue.

"I was going crazy with guilt, thinking that I ruined everything. I thought that you hated me, that I ruined your one chance at being happy. And for what? A boy? A boy who…I…ugh. Maya, Lucas is my brother. Nothing more."

"But I thought you decided you still liked him?"

"I thought that too. But I took these past three days to really think about things and why all of a sudden I seemed to have started liking him again. And I realized that I didn't actually like him that way. I just wanted to make myself believe that because all the feelings I was feeling, of sadness, of jealousy, of longing? They were all directed toward you; I was jealous of Lucas because he had a chance with you and I didn't. I don't want him, Maya. I just want you." The intensity of her last sentence shocks you and you don't know what to believe because it all seems too good to be true. You shake your head and you close your eyes, thinking this is a dream but when you open them again, Riley's just patiently looking at you, a small smile on her face.

"So you like me?" Riley nods her head.

"So you don't want Lucas?" Riley shakes her head no.

"So you want me?" At this, Riley laughs and shakes her head, fondly looking at you. She scoots a little closer to you, the previous gap between you two barely nonexistent as she brings her hand to the back of your neck. She looks directly in your eyes and starts inching her face towards yours, occasionally looking down at your lips, but mostly maintaining eye contact with you. Your world gets fuzzy and all you can really see is Riley's eyes and you can feel the warmth of her hand on your neck that's driving you insane. You can feel her breath on your lips and then you feel her lips on your head, your eyes, your cheek, and finally on the corner of your mouth. Your body tenses and then melts as she finally puts her lips on yours and you realize this is what heaven must feel like. The feeling that rushes through you is indescribable but now you think you understand what all the famous love poems were talking about. Your lips move against hers, slowly, softly. You relish in the softness of her lips and you bravely bite down on her lower lip, surprising the both of you but you decide it's a good thing because of the little, breathy sigh that escapes through Riley's lips. You run one hand through her hair and she holds your neck tighter, pulling you closer to her as if she wanted to become one. And in that moment, you think you might not know what you believe in but you do believe that Riley is your princess and you thank whatever is out there in the universe for sending her your way.


End file.
